Specificity and flexibility in early word recognition

早期单词识别的特异性和灵活性

• 批准号: 402675-2011
• 负责人: White, Katherine
• 金额: $ 2.11万
• 依托单位: University of Waterloo
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2015-01-01 至 2016-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=573354
• 关键词: Specificity; flexibility; early; word; recognition

The ability to recognize spoken words plays a crucial role in human interactions. Yet, word recognition is an extraordinarily complicated process: the same word can sound very different across contexts and speakers. For example, the vowel in the word "dog" is quite different when produced by a speaker from Toronto and a speaker from New York City. Little work has addressed the extent to which young word learners can adapt to variability in pronunciations across contexts and speakers, but it is an important issue. If a child from Toronto hears the NYC pronunciation of "dog", should she interpret it as a mispronounced version of the familiar word "dog", or as a new word? Because young word learners have a well-documented bias to assume that each new word signals a new meaning, a failure to identify the same word in different contexts has the potential to slow vocabulary acquisition. The proposed research explores the factors that influence whether and when toddlers are able to adapt to new pronunciations of words, including particulars of the pronunciation itself (how it differs from the typical pronunciation) and the types of real-world knowledge (e.g., visual context, knowledge about the speaker) toddlers can use to interpret unusual pronunciations. For example, hearing an unusual pronunciation of the word "dog" when there is an unfamiliar object in the scene may make toddlers more likely to consider it a new word than when all of the objects have known labels. This work also examines the level of abstraction at which learning about a new accent occurs. Is learning specific to particular words spoken by particular individuals, or does it occur at a more abstract level, generalizing to other words in the lexicon, or to other speakers? This research will help us understand whether or not children recognize words in the same way as adults. Further, understanding the abilities that underlie successful word recognition may lead to earlier diagnosis and treatment of children struggling with comprehension difficulties.

识别口语单词的能力在人类互动中起着至关重要的作用。然而，单词识别是一个异常复杂的过程：同一个单词在不同的背景和说话者之间可能会有很大的不同。例如，当来自多伦多的说话者和来自纽约市的说话者发出的元音时，词中的元音是非常不同的。 很少有研究涉及到年轻的单词学习者在多大程度上能够适应不同语境和说话人的发音变化，但这是一个重要的问题。如果一个来自多伦多的孩子听到纽约市发音为“Dog”，她应该将其解释为熟悉单词“Dog”的发音错误版本，还是应该解释为一个新词？由于年轻的单词学习者有一种有据可查的偏见，即认为每个新单词都代表一个新的含义，因此在不同的语境中识别同一个单词的失败可能会减缓词汇习得。 这项拟议的研究探索了影响幼儿是否以及何时能够适应新单词发音的因素，包括发音本身的细节(它与典型发音有何不同)，以及幼儿可以用来解释不寻常发音的现实世界知识的类型(例如，视觉语境、关于说话者的知识)。例如，当场景中有一个不熟悉的物体时，听到单词“狗”的不同寻常的发音，可能会让蹒跚学步的孩子比当所有物体都有已知标签时更有可能认为它是一个新词。这项研究还考察了学习一种新口音的抽象程度。学习是特定于特定个人所说的特定单词，还是发生在更抽象的层面上，概括到词典中的其他单词，或者其他说话者？ 这项研究将帮助我们了解儿童是否像成年人一样识别单词。此外，了解成功识别单词的能力可能有助于对患有理解困难的儿童进行更早的诊断和治疗。